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Nilus, or Nilus for Gehon. Surely, if Moses had meant Nilus when he named Gehon, he would have called the river (into which he was cast upon reeds, and preserved by God, working compassion in the b daughter of Pharaoh) a river of Egypt, wherein he was born and bred, and wrought so many miracles. Besides, the river of Nilus is often named in the scriptures, but never by the name of Gehon. And if Moses had told the Israelites that Nilus had been a river of paradise, they might justly have thought that he had derided them: for they had lived there all the days of their lives, and found no such paradise at all, nor any memory or speech thereof; except we shall believe the paradise of Hesperides, where, saith Pliny, there was nothing found in his time but wild olives, instead of golden apples. But Nilus is twice called Sichor, once in d Isaiah and once in the prophet e Jeremy; and yet in those places it is not said to be a river of Ethiopia, but of Egypt. For in a word, the Israelites had never any communion or affairs with the Ethiopians, nor any intelligence or trade beyond Egypt to the south; but the enemies which they had on the south and east parts were these nations of the Chusites, Philistines, Ismaelites, Amalekites, and Midianites; who being often governed by many little kings, or reguli, were distinguished in names, according to the fathers and heads of those nations; but in one general name were all Arabians. On the north side of Canaan, they were afflicted with the Colesyrians, with the Magogians, Tubalines, and others their adherents; and, thirdly, within themselves, the nations which remained of the ancient Canaanites held the strongest cities upon the sea-coast, as Tyre, Sidon, Acon, Gaza, and many others: yea, Jerusalem itself was withheld from Israel (from the days of Moses even unto the time of David) by the Jebusites.

That which now remaineth of most difficulty is, that it doth not appear that any part of Gehon watereth that part of Arabia the Stony, which the Chusites inhabited in the

b Exod. ii.

e Plin. lib. 5. c. 1.

d Isaiah xxiii. 3. e Jer. ii. 18.

times of the kings of Israel: and in this desert it was, that Matt. Beroaldus lost himself in seeking out paradise: for he was driven (to my understanding) to create two rivers, and call them Gehon and Pison; to the end that the one might water Chus, and the other Havilah, for I find none such in rerum natura as he hath described: by which rivers he also includeth within paradise even Arabia the Desert.

And as he well proved that Pison was not Ganges, nor Gehon Nilus; so where to find them elsewhere, it seemeth he knew not. Certainly this river of Gehon, which he maketh to fall into the Mediterranean at Gaza, and whose springs he findeth far east in Arabia, is but imaginary: for the current by Gaza is but a small stream, rising between it and the Red sea, whose head from Gaza itself is little more than twenty English miles, as shall appear hereafter. But, questionless, hence it comes that many were mistaken. They all considered of the habitations of the Chusites as they were planted when the state of Israel stood, and when it flourished, being then their near neighbours, and never looked back to the first seats and plantation of Chus. For after the flood, Chus and his children never rested till they found the valley of Shinar, in which and near which himself with his sons first inhabited. Havilah took the riverside of Tigris chiefly on the east, which after his own name he called Havilah, now Susiana: Raamah and Sheba further down the river, in the entrance of Arabia Fœlix. Nimrod seated himself in the best of the valley, where he built Babel, whereof that region had afterwards the name of Babylonia. Chus himself and his brother Mizraim first kept upon Gehon, which falleth into the lakes of Chaldea, and in process of time, and as their people increased, they drew themselves more westerly towards the Red or Arabian sea: from whence Mizraim passed over into Egypt, in which tract the Chusites remained for many years after. Now because there could be no such river found in Arabia the Stony, which they might entitle Gehon, they translated Chus Ethiopia, and Gehon Nilus. And if we do examine this mistaking by example, we shall the better perceive it as it was.

For let us suppose that Brute, or whosoever else that first. peopled this island, had arrived upon the river Thames, and calling the island after his name Britannia, it might be said that Thames or Tems was a river that watered Britannia : and when afterwards, in process of time, the same Brute had also discovered and conquered Scotland, which he also entitled by the same name of Britannia, after-ages might conclude that Scotland was no part thereof, because the river Tems is not found therein. Or let us suppose that Europa, the daughter of the king of Tyre in Phoenicia, gave the name to Europe, according to Herodotus, lib. 1. and 4, and that the first discoverers thereof arrived in the mouth of some river in Thrace, which then watered as much of Europe as he first discovered; shall we in like sort resolve, that France, Spain, and Italy, &c. are no part of Europe, because that river is not found in them, or any of them? In like manner was it said by Moses, in his description of Gehon, that it watered the whole land of Chus; but not the whole land which the Chusites should or might in future time conquer, people, and inhabit, seeing in after-ages they became lords of many nations, and they might, perchance, have been masters, in time, (as the Saracens which came of them were,) of a great part of the world. For though the Babylonian empire, which took beginning in Nimrod the son of Chus, consisted at the first but of four cities, to wit, Babel, Erech, Acad, and Chalne, yet we find, that his successors within a few years after commanded all the whole world in effect and the fame of Babel consumed the memory of Chusea. For of this tower of confusion did all that land take the name of Babylonia: and the greatness of that empire, founded by Nimrod a younger son, obscured the name and nation of his father Cush in those parts, until they crept further off, and in places not yet entitled, and further from the Babylonian empire, where the Chusites retained their names, which also they fastened to the soil and territory by themselves afterwards inhabited and held. And we may not think that Chus, or any of his, could in haste creep through those desert regions, which the length of 130 years

after the flood had, as it were, fortified with thickets, and permitted every bush and brier, reed and tree, to join themselves, as it were, into one main body and forest. For if we look with judgment and reason into the world's plantation, we shall find that every family seated themselves as near together as possibly they could; and though necessity enforced them, after they grew full of people, to spread themselves, and creep out of Shinar or Babylonia, yet did they it with this advice, as that they might at all times resort, and succour one another by river, the fields being then (without all doubt) impassable, So Nimrod, who out of wit and strength usurped dominion over the rest, sat down in the very confluence of all those rivers which watered paradise: for thither it was to which the greatest troops of Noah's children repaired; and from the same place whence mankind had his beginning, from thence had they again their increase. The first father of men, Adam, had therein his former habitation. The second father of mankind, Noah, began from thence his dispersion.

Now as Nimrod the youngest, yet strongest, made his choice of Babel, as aforesaid, which both Tigris and Euphrates cleansed and enriched; so did Havilah place himself upon Piso-Tigris; Raamah and his son Sheba further down upon the same river, on the sea-coast of Arabia; Chus himself upon Gehon, the fairest branch of Euphrates. And when they began to spread themselves further off, yet they always fastened themselves to the rivers' sides: for Nineveh, Charran, Reseph, Canneh, Ur in Chaldea, and the other first peopled cities, were all founded upon these navigable rivers, or their branches, by which the one might give succour and assistance to the other, as is already often remembered.

SECT. XV.

A conclusion by way of repetition of some things spoken of before.

BUT now to conclude this dispute, it appeareth to me by the testimonies of the scriptures, that paradise was a place created by God, and a part of this our earth and ha

bitable world, seated in the lower part of the region of Eden, afterwards called Aram Fluviorum, or Mesopotamia, which taketh into it also a portion of Shinar and Armenia: this region standing in the most excellent temper of all others, to wit, thirty-five degrees from the equinoctial, and fifty-five from the north pole: in which climate the most excellent wines, fruits, oil, grain of all sorts, are to this day found in abundance. And there is nothing that better proveth the excellency of this said soil and temper, than the abundant growing of the palm-trees without the care and labour of man. For wherein soever the earth, nature, and the sun, can most vaunt that they have excelled, yet shall this plant be the greatest wonder of all their works: this tree alone giveth unto man whatsoever his life beggeth at nature's hand. And though it may be said that these trees are found both in the East and West Indies, which countries are also blessed with a perpetual spring and summer; yet lay down by those pleasures and benefits the fearful and dangerous thunders and lightnings, the horrible and frequent earthquakes, the dangerous diseases, the multitude of venomous beasts and worms, with other inconveniences, and then there will be found no comparison between the one and the other.

What other excellences this garden of paradise had, before God (for man's ingratitude and cruelty) cursed the earth, we cannot judge; but I may safely think that by how much Adam exceeded all living men in perfection, by being the immediate workmanship of God, by so much did that chosen and particular garden exceed all parts of the universal world in which God had planted, that is, made to grow, the trees of life, of knowledge; plants only proper, and becoming the paradise and garden of so great a lord.

The sum of all this is, that whereas the eyes of men in this scripture have been dim-sighted, (some of them finding paradise beyond our known world; some, above the middle region of the air; some, elevated near the moon; others, as far south as the line, or as far north as the pole, &c.) I